


could be a lot of things

by verity



Series: mechanic!Stiles [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Cars, Competence Kink, Failwolf Friday, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-11
Updated: 2013-01-11
Packaged: 2017-11-25 02:43:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/634277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verity/pseuds/verity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek gets out of the Camaro to open up the hood. It's Friday afternoon and the car's safely parked on the shoulder; this isn't the worst time to stall out. Right.</p>
            </blockquote>





	could be a lot of things

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HalfFizzbin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfFizzbin/gifts), [Hatteress (goddammitstacey)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddammitstacey/gifts).



> Written for the very first Failwolf Friday on tumblr.

"So, hmm," Stiles says, leaning over the… the part of the car that's under the hood. The tips of his fingers are already dark with grease. "I mean, it's probably not, like, the fuel pump, or the ballast resistor—I don't think this car even has a ballast resistor—but it could be—wait, are you even following me?"

"Run that by me again," Derek says.

The car stalled out fifteen minutes ago, two miles down the road from the high school on a sunny Friday afternoon. Derek tried to restart it five or ten times before he got out of the car and put up the hood. Looking underneath didn't really help. Laura always bought new cars and traded them in after two years; they had the money for it. The AAA card was in the glovebox and Erica's uncle owned a garage the next town over. There were options.

Stiles pulled up then, though, and came to a jerky stop on the shoulder about thirty feet ahead of Derek. "You got a problem?" he said. "I have jumper cables, I have wolfsbane, I have beef jerky—"

"—how long have you had this car, anyway? This is a 2010, right?" Stiles says. 

"Uh, yeah," Derek says.

"You sound real certain of that, dude." Stiles has his hands down in the guts of the Camaro now, feeling around the battery. The battery is the only thing under the hood that Derek can name, although he used to listen to Click and Clack with his dad sometimes, so he knows that engines have cylinders and—cylinders. "Is this even your car?"

Derek shoves his hands in his pockets. "No. It's Laura's."

"Awkward," Stiles says after a minute, He reaches up to wipe away the sweat beading on his forehead and leaves a long smear of grease behind, the kind of thing Laura would have cleaned off with a thumb and some spit. "My dad got me the Jeep when I finished middle school. He said that if I could get it to run I could drive it."

"So you've been driving since you were fourteen?" Derek says.

"Very funny," Stiles says.

The traffic at their side is petering out, the after school rush over. The sun's still pretty high; the back of Derek's shirt is damp under his jacket. He misses the Camaro's air conditioning. "Do you know what's wrong or not?"

"Oh, it could be a lot of things." There's a smudge on the inside of Stiles's wrist, now, where he braced it on the edge of something. "When I was rebuilding the Jeep, I spent two fucking months swapping out every fuse and turning the Chilton manual inside out before Dad told me to check the choke. Then I spent four months delivering papers to pay to get a mechanic to replace the choke pulloff because I wasn't sure I could put everything back together after I did it."

"So you think it's the choke?" Derek says.

Stiles narrowly avoids hitting his head on the hood as he straightens up. "Your positive battery cable's shorted out."

Derek stares at him.

Stiles rolls his eyes. "Isn't this still under warranty? Just get it towed to the dealership."

"Yeah," Derek says. "I'll do that."

The blackness under the hood has crept up Stiles's fingers, covered his palms, inched up his inner arms. Derek wants to spit in his hand and wipe it all off, replace the cold scent of grease with his own. Instead, he walks around the trunk, pops the hood, finds one of his spare shirts. It's not that clean. He tosses it to Stiles. "Ugh, is that blood?" Stiles squints at the shirt. "I think I'll pass."

"It's not blood," Derek says. (It's blood.)

"Whatever," Stiles says, wiping his hands before tossing back the shirt. "Your laundry, your problem."

Stiles's hands and wrists are murky, like they're coming out of a grey fog, and there are still dark half-moons under his nails that won't come clean without soap. The last time Derek saw Stiles's hands that grimy, they were coated in mountain ash, right up his forearms, and Stiles was vibrating with concentration, strength, belief. He always gets it in the same places, the back of his hand sliding across the forehead, his left thumb pressing against his right wrist, while his fingers move steadily, knowledgeably. Derek doesn't know anything.

"Come on, you've got the paperwork, right? You've got AAA?" Stiles says.

Derek nods. "In the glovebox."

"I'll wait with you," Stiles says. "If you want."

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [ladyofthelog](http://ladyofthelog.tumblr.com) on tumblr.


End file.
